2015 Ardennes: 79th La Fleche Wallonne - Mur de Huy - 205.5k

[ferryman]

Good race. Hope all the crashees are OK...

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Gesink 25th and ahead of R.Costa in his 2nd race of the season. Lol...

edit: also ahead of Kwiat

 

[DFA123]

Re:

1 Valverde

2 Alaphilippe

3 Albasini

4 Rodriguez

5 Moreno

6 Vuillermoz

7 Henao

8 Fuglsang

9 Slagter

10 Kelderman

The locals won't be happy to have no-one in the top ten!

 

[jaylew]

Re:

Probably not a popular opinion, but I actually prefer FW to have everyone together at the bottom of the Mur and then everyone to go nuts for a few minutes. It's the one race each year I don't want tactical complexity in.

I liked the extra action before the Mur but I might have to agree with you. Still, you can't truly judge based on just one year of the new course

 

[TourOfSardinia]

Any news on Chris Froome - after those falls?

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

Re: Re:

Probably not a popular opinion, but I actually prefer FW to have everyone together at the bottom of the Mur and then everyone to go nuts for a few minutes. It's the one race each year I don't want tactical complexity in.

That doesn't make sense. If everyone is together at the foot of the Muur, then it's insanely tactical, with all riders fighting for position and trying to find the right wheel to follow, not to go full gas too early. It was less tactical today, with everyone knackered after the previous climb - no-one had the legs to time a sprint or to try to attack early.

The only tactical concern in most editions of FW is when to go all out on the final climb. That's it. One decision. It's not that there are no tactics involved, it's that there's no tactical complexity. A harder course starts introducing other factors. In almost every race that would be a good thing, but FW has a kind of numbskull purity.

 

[hrotha]

Re:

Gesink 25th and ahead of R.Costa in his 2nd race of the season. Lol...

Yeah but Rui Costa shone a lot more thanks to the hilarious way he went backwards after having Valls pull.

 

[Bye Bye Bicycle]

Crash --> Crash --> Sprint

This even worse then the Scheldeprijs, because there we are at least spared Valverde wins.

 

[Jagartrott]

Don't agree with some here: the penultimate climb is a good addition. If more than one rider makes the move (say 3 or 4) they really have a chance to actually make it. Now it was Wellens alone, which was brave a he really looked good, but impossible. If you have more guys, you also may make some teams hesitate.

 

[TheQuick]

All the classics are really disappointing this year !

 

[Bushman]

Re: Re:

Damn it. Pace up the Mur wasn't high. Kwiatkowski had a chance to win it but bad positionning :/

Didnt have the legs at all.

If he had had the legs he would have been positioned in the front as he always is. He dropped back on the penultimate climb.

He was leading out Alaphilippe in the last kms. Alaphilippe sitting at his back for a long time already

What? Alaphillippe closed down Nibali and Kreuziger on the second to last climb and Kwiatkowski was already pretty far back there. Then Alaphkllippe kept riding at the front of the peloton and Kwiat never made it there.

 

[May0maniac]

Re: Re:

Gesink 25th and ahead of R.Costa in his 2nd race of the season. Lol...

Yeah but Rui Costa shone a lot more thanks to the hilarious way he went backwards after having Valls pull.

Was that Valls? I thought it was Ulissi.

 

[Miburo]

Re:

All the classics are really disappointing this year !

Jokes on you for expecting anything from the ardennes.

 

[burning]

Re:

All the classics are really disappointing this year !

Yeah, G-W was pretty disappointing indeed.

 

[jaylew]

Re: 2015 Ardennes: 79th La Fleche Wallonne - Mur de Huy - 20

this F-W could be the most obvious & predictable winning move ever--Valverde only had to sprint on the last 100 metres to get the job done. LOL

True. It was obvious who would win halfway up the Mur. Bala riding on the front but obviously not going for it yet.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Probably not a popular opinion, but I actually prefer FW to have everyone together at the bottom of the Mur and then everyone to go nuts for a few minutes. It's the one race each year I don't want tactical complexity in.

That doesn't make sense. If everyone is together at the foot of the Muur, then it's insanely tactical, with all riders fighting for position and trying to find the right wheel to follow, not to go full gas too early. It was less tactical today, with everyone knackered after the previous climb - no-one had the legs to time a sprint or to try to attack early.

The only tactical concern in most editions of FW is when to go all out on the final climb. That's it. One decision.

Well it is if you don't count positioning as tactics. The fight for position on the old FW course started about 10km before the Mur. This course was less tactical, because positioning didn't really matter in such a small group and nobody had any real sprint left after the penultimate climb.

 

[Pricey_sky]

Re:

Boring sprint again. Sky **** it up for Henao, he was alone constanly and needed to work himself up in the peleton often, I could see sometimes that Roche was sitting in the front and not going down and help he's captain in the middle of the peleton !

Can't really blame the team with Poels, Nordhaug and Froome all caught up in the crashes. Henao was only a couple of metres behind Valverde with 300m to go, if he had the legs he could have followed but he didn't.

 

[Bushman]

Re:

Gesink 25th and ahead of R.Costa in his 2nd race of the season. Lol...

edit: also ahead of Kwiat

It doesn't really matter who you beat to 25th place since riders so far back either dont have it or isn't trying too hard.

Still good to see Gesink back racing again.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Kwiat also really weak. Alaphilippe saved Etixx here

 

[Cance > TheRest]

Re:

Probably not a popular opinion, but I actually prefer FW to have everyone together at the bottom of the Mur and then everyone to go nuts for a few minutes. It's the one race each year I don't want tactical complexity in.

The usual Huy ascent actually does require a bit of tactical sense: finding the right moment to attack. Everybody knew that today, so attacking too early on Huy was a no-go. Combined with Valverdes pacesetting, that kept the favourites together until the last 200 meters.

 

[hrotha]

Re: Re:

Gesink 25th and ahead of R.Costa in his 2nd race of the season. Lol...

Yeah but Rui Costa shone a lot more thanks to the hilarious way he went backwards after having Valls pull.

Was that Valls? I thought it was Ulissi.

Dunno, the commentator said Valls and the quality of the stream was too low to judge by myself.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Re: Re:

Gesink 25th and ahead of R.Costa in his 2nd race of the season. Lol...

edit: also ahead of Kwiat

It doesn't really matter who you beat to 25th place since riders so far back either dont have it or isn't trying too hard.

Still good to see Gesink back racing again.

It does matter if you know where Gesink is coming from.

 

[HelloDolly]

Re:

Boring sprint again. Sky **** it up for Henao, he was alone constanly and needed to work himself up in the peleton often, I could see sometimes that Roche was sitting in the front and not going down and help he's captain in the middle of the peleton !

Henao didn't have the legs...In final KM everyone were on the limit after the penultimate climb
No one f***ed up for Henao ....Roche was behind him and holding on
Stop with the bull ...he was beaten fair & square

 

[Jelantik]

Froome hit the deck again. Valverde is the master of sprinting out to the line. No one can beat him. Wonder where's majka. Not bad from TS with kreuziger finish in the first group. Still not enough resul

 

[jaylew]

Re:

Crash --> Crash --> Sprint

This even worse then the Scheldeprijs, because there we are at least spared Valverde wins.

Speak for yourself. Some of us love to see him win.